2 Suspended Without Pay In Jail Inquiry

October 17, 1985|By Jonathon King, Staff Writer

Two Broward County Sheriff`s Office detention deputies have been suspended without pay after an investigation into the death last month of a woman in the Broward County Jail, a sheriff`s spokesman said Wednesday.

One of the suspended women deputies was the first to find 37-year-old Kathryn Entress lying in her cell Sept. 29 after suffering an asthma attack, but the deputy failed to immediately report an emergency medical situation, said sheriff`s spokesman Jim Leljedal.

``One was the first employee to find the woman, and she did not report what was obviously a serious condition,`` Leljedal said. ``We don`t know if (Entress) was alive at that point or not.``

Leljedal said he was unsure of the second deputy`s involvement, but that both were suspended for failure to follow proper procedure.

According to a Sheriff`s Office report of the incident, Entress` body was found at 5:55 a.m. Sept. 29, sprawled on the concrete floor of the tiny cubicle on the fifth floor of the jail in downtown Fort Lauderdale.

However, a sheriff`s spokesman later said the body was discovered at 6:42 a.m. during routine rounds by detention deputies.

Although Entress was examined immediately by a jail nurse, who reported that she showed no vital signs, the death was not reported to paramedics until an hour later, authorities said.

Names of the two suspended deputies were not available late Wednesday night, but Leljedal said one of the women had been hired just before the incident and the other was an experienced detention employee.

Leljedal said that the two deputies had been suspended with pay last week and that the suspensions were continued without pay when the investigation was completed Wednesday.

Results of that investigation have been turned over to the State Attorney`s Office and were not available, Leljedal said.

Leljedal said the decision to send the investigative records to the State Attorney`s Office was made by Sheriff Nick Navarro after a meeting with upper- level Sheriff`s Office staff members.

An autopsy performed after the incident showed that Entress had died of natural causes after an asthma attack.

A Broward medical examiner later said that a non-prescription inhaler that usually controlled Entress` asthma attacks was taken from her when she was booked into the jail.

Entress had been arrested on a warrant charging her with failing to appear in court to face petty theft charges. She was jailed after she was unable to post $250 bail.

The charges were filed in May after police said she stole water from the city by bypassing a water line in her trailer home. Her water had been turned off when she failed to pay her water bills.